Protecting Your Voice and Likeness From AI Deepfakes

Generative tools can put a stranger’s words in a familiar voice, or build a face that is close enough for an ad. The legal response depends on what was copied. A name used as a brand is a trademark question. A copied recording is a copyright question. A synthetic voice or face used commercially is, in the United States, mostly a state publicity question, plus whatever the platform’s rules say. Those routes use different forms. Filing the wrong one wastes the week you needed.

This page stays at that level on purpose. It is for creators, athletes, and musicians in the United States. The matching pages are creators, athletes, and musicians. For the name as a brand, use the creator guide and the username guide. An older site piece on AI voice cloning and Drake is background, not a source of rules.

What exists today

There is no single federal statute, currently in force, that gives every person in the country a right to control AI replicas of their voice and likeness. Publicity rights grew up in the states. Some states have a statute. Some rely on court decisions. Coverage of voice, of deceased people, and of non-commercial speech is not the same everywhere. If you need a rule for a specific state, read that state’s statute or talk to a lawyer there. This guide does not turn those differences into a chart.

Federal trademark law still matters when the use is about source or sponsorship. The USPTO says a trademark identifies goods or services. It does not give you the word in the abstract. Separately, 15 U.S.C. § 1125(a) reaches a false or misleading representation likely to cause confusion about affiliation, sponsorship, or approval. A deepfake that also uses your name, or that is staged to look like an endorsement, can raise that issue. A deepfake that never trades on the name as a brand may not. The statute is not a finding about your clip.

Copyright sits beside both. It protects original works, such as a song, a photo, or a video you created. It does not automatically give you a copyright in your voice or your face as such. That is why a copyright takedown and a likeness complaint are different paperwork.

Tennessee’s ELVIS Act

On March 21, 2024, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed the Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security Act. The governor’s office called it an update to the state’s Protection of Personal Rights law, adding protections for the voice of songwriters, performers, and music-industry professionals against AI misuse. The office said the preexisting law covered name, image, and likeness, and did not specifically address generative tools that let users make unauthorized works in another person’s image and voice. It described the act as adding “voice” to that protection. The signing announcement is on tn.gov. The office also called the act first of its kind. That is the state’s description, not a finding by a court.

The definition now in the code is specific. Tenn. Code Ann. § 47-25-1102 says “voice” means a sound in a medium that is readily identifiable and attributable to a particular individual, regardless of whether the sound contains the actual voice or a simulation of the voice. The history note cites 2024, chapter 588. “Likeness” in the same section means the use of an image of an individual for commercial purposes. “Individual” includes a human being, living or dead.

Read those sentences narrowly. They are definitions in a Tennessee statute. They do not enact the same rule in every other state. They do not tell you, by themselves, whether a particular song prompt, parody, or news clip is unlawful. Exemptions, remedies, and who can sue are in the rest of that part of the code, and they should be read there rather than summarized from memory. If the use has a real connection to Tennessee, that statute is one of the first places to look. If it does not, another state’s law may be the one that matters.

Variety reported on November 7, 2026 that Elvis Presley rightsholders, including Authentic Brands Group and Raleigh Music Publishing, sued Suno in the Northern District of California and alleged both copyright infringement and a violation of the ELVIS Act, and that Eminem’s publisher Eight Mile Style filed its own case. Those are allegations. Suno denied trading on name or likeness. The report is summarized in Elvis and Eminem rightsholders sue Suno.

The proposed NO FAKES Act

The NO FAKES Act of 2026 is a bill, not a statute you can enforce. Congress.gov identifies it as S. 4591 in the 119th Congress. Senator Christopher Coons introduced it on May 20, 2026. The latest action listed there, when this page was written, is June 24, 2026: placed on the Senate legislative calendar under General Orders, Calendar No. 446. The tracker has not moved it to “passed Senate,” “passed House,” or “became law.”

The Congressional Research Service summary of the version reported to the Senate on June 24, 2026 says the bill would create a federal intellectual-property right against unauthorized digital replicas of a person’s voice or visual likeness. In that summary, the right would let the individual or right holder authorize a digital replica, or authorize use of the voice or likeness for a product or service. The summary says the right is not assignable during the person’s lifetime, is licensable, and does not expire at death. It describes civil liability for specified uses, such as distributing a digital replica without authorization, and exceptions for categories that include news reporting, sports broadcasts, and satire. It also describes a notice-and-takedown process, a counter-notice process, and preemption of state digital-replica laws except for causes of action under state statutes or common law in existence as of January 2, 2025.

That is a summary of a committee version. The text can change. A calendar placement is not a vote of the full Senate. Do not plan a business, a contract, or a takedown on the assumption that this bill is law. The record is S. 4591 on Congress.gov.

Takedowns

Platforms write their own reporting tools, and the labels differ. The useful distinction is the right you are asserting.

• Copyright, when a specific work you own was copied. A recording, a photograph, or a video can qualify. A synthetic performance that imitates you, without copying a particular recording, often does not fit this form. Sending a copyright notice about material you do not own can create its own problem.
• Trademark, when your name, logo, or other mark is used as a brand, or in a way that suggests you are the source or the sponsor. A registration makes that report easier to document. An unregistered mark can still be a basis in some forms, with a harder proof problem.
• Impersonation or synthetic media, when the harm is a fake account or a generated face or voice. This is the form that matches many deepfakes. The platform decides whether its policy applies. A policy is not a court.

Before you report, save the URL, the date, and a screenshot or recording. Write down what was used: name, face, voice, logo, or a specific work. After you report, save the confirmation. If the content stays up, the next step might be a demand letter or a lawsuit in a court that actually has power over the user. That choice depends on facts this page does not have.

A cease-and-desist letter is a demand. It is not a judgment. Front Office Sports reported on November 5, 2026 that LeBron James’s representatives, and Luka Dončić’s camp, sent that kind of letter to an AI betting app over a promo that evoked James. See the Bron AI report.

Where a trademark helps, and where it stops

Registering your name or logo gives you the benefits the USPTO lists: a public record, a legal presumption that you own the mark and have the right to use it, a basis for filing abroad, the ability to sue in federal court, the ® symbol for the goods and services in the registration, and the option to record with U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The office is not an enforcement agency. Those points are from why register your trademark.

That package is aimed at brand use. It supports a complaint about merch, a fake store, or an ad that uses the name so people think you approved it. It does not confer a property right in a voice. It does not replace the ELVIS Act inside Tennessee, and it does not fill the gap the NO FAKES Act is trying to fill nationally, because that bill is not law. If the clone never uses the name or logo, start with publicity law and the platform’s impersonation tools, and treat the trademark as a separate question about the brand.

Common-law trademark rights from use are geographically limited. A federal registration is nationwide in the United States and its territories, and nowhere else. The United States, United Kingdom, and European Union pages are separate filings. Voice and image rules outside the US are outside this page.

A practical sequence

1. Preserve the clip and the URL the day you see it.
2. Decide which right is actually involved: a copied work, a brand, a face, a voice, or more than one.
3. Send the matching platform report. Do not send a copyright notice for a voice you cannot claim as a work.
4. If the name is the brand people buy, run a free name check and read the username and brand-name guide before you assume you already have paperwork a platform will accept.
5. If the voice or face is the issue, identify the state or country connected to the use before you cite a statute. Tennessee’s definition is a starting point only when Tennessee law applies.

Related reading

• Elvis and Eminem rightsholders sue Suno
• Bron AI cease-and-desist report
• Creator name, brand, and likeness
• Athlete NIL protection
• For musicians · for creators · for athletes

Sources

• Tennessee governor’s office, March 21, 2024, ELVIS Act signing
• Tenn. Code Ann. § 47-25-1102 (2025)
• Congress.gov, S. 4591, NO FAKES Act of 2026, including the CRS summary of the version reported June 24, 2026
• USPTO, “What is a trademark?”
• USPTO, “Why register your trademark?”
• 15 U.S.C. § 1125(a)
• Variety, November 7, 2026, Elvis and Eminem rightsholders sue Suno
• Front Office Sports, November 5, 2026, LeBron James and Bron AI

Frequently asked questions